Right now my family is waiting for my grandfather to die. He had a heart attack two weeks ago that tore an irreparable hole between ventricles. Doctors put him on hospice care and we have all been gathering in Birmingham, Alabama, to say goodbye.

Waiting for someone to die is in some ways waiting for someone to be born. You know the time will come. You may have an approximate idea of when that will be. But no one can tell you for sure, nor exactly how, nor what will happen next.

It’s natural to feel anxious by such lack of specificity, in death or any other human endeavor.